i have had raccoons at my pond, as evidenced by turned over pots, fish pieces and terrified survivors, but i havn't seen any indications that they got INTO the pond.
the liner edges are all covered by rocks, and in a few places where the liner shows, as where the waterfall dumps into the pond, or on the sides of the stream, i laid down two layers of the liner. so far so good here and good luck to you too! a punctured liner must be a nightmare to repair.
min

Racoons can rip a liner to shreds, but they generally do not unless they either fall in or are hunting. They can make a godawful mess going after plants and cleaning food in the water but just walking on the liner is usually ok. As long as they are not likely to be going after fish or digging after crustaceans in the plants you should be fairly safe, that said you never know what the lil' buggers will do but it sounds like you will be ok.

joel_bc
you might want to look at the last post on june 28 '07 from buyorsell888 on the 'i never thought i would hate raccoons' thread. they DO go right into the water!

maybe you still have time to make a deep pond with straight sides.

min

We're well beyond the pond-shaping phase. The pond has a deep and a shallow end. We just hope we are not leaving any incentive for the racoons to take a plunge into the pond.

So - at least for the time being - we've ruled out fish. We've got just a few snails living in there, and have only seen one or two tadpoles (we didn't introduce them - the frogs just laid some eggs, we guess). Does anyone have a list of aquatic plants that racoons like? If so, it would help us to avoid trouble.

They get into my ponds with no fish on a regular basis.

I have seen them all the way in the water with my own eyes though when I turned on the camera the noise of the lens extending scared them away. The water isn't deep, about 18".

They do not dive in though, they wade in. IF your shallow end is shallow enough or if you have shallow shelves they certainly will get in.

You want straight deep sides but they will still come and feel all around the sides looking for food. They dislodge rocks on my ponds all the time.

They will not know there are not any fish in there. They also eat snails, frogs and crayfish and they will look for them in there too.

My fish pond is protected with an electric fence but there is no way to electrify every other pond that I have to keep them out. They investigate every single one of them except the one behind the greenhouse door.

They have poked holes in one of my liners. We are waiting for the tadpoles to all morph before we drain it and fix it. The pond has dirt on top of the liner but bare liner for about a foot on the sides below the rock ledge. They've either poked holes with their claws or worn them with the rocks.

buyorsell888, you wrote: "They have poked holes in one of my liners. We are waiting for the tadpoles to all morph before we drain it and fix it. The pond has dirt on top of the liner but bare liner for about a foot on the sides below the rock ledge. They've either poked holes with their claws or worn them with the rocks."

Do you have a poly plastic liner, or butyl (artificial rubber)?

I'm curious about this, because at the pond-building workshop I attended, led by a well-known local landscape architect & pond builder, the information given was that butyl is resistent to damage from just about anything except vandals intending to damage it with knives and the like.

Joel, I doubt if your liner is made of Butyl rubber, more likely EPDM rubber.
A raccoons claw can pierce an EPDM liner if the animal gets the notion to do so. He/she may just be trying to scoop up a snail or some other tasty morsel and puncture the liner inadvertently.
There was a recent thread here, about the poster finding the hose to her pump/filter, punctured in several places by the teeth of a raccoon.
I have had that happen also. I awoke to find my pond almost empty of water and looked around where my filter is located. There was water spurting in all directions from little punctures in the hose. If I had turned the music on, it would have been a show to equal that of the Bellagio casino in Las Vegas!
Raccoons are naturally curious, and like dogs, cats etc,they investigate with their teeth and claws. So it is quite possible that they could puncture your liner, not being malicious, but by just doing their thing.
"Horton"

yeah, I saw a young raccoon approach my pond this morning while I was on the porch. The sound of me flipping open my camera phone made him turn around but only briefly. He then proceeded to walk along the edge and was looking like he was going to take a dip, then I clapped and he ran off.

Can't wait for the next step of his "progression into adulthood." Geez.

Okay, so maybe I've got two questions at this point:

How resistent to punctures is the supposedly indestructible butyl rubber?

And with a 2500-gallon pond, how would you locate small punctures if they did occur? (Because I believe that, where the depth is a foot or more of water, the air is all squished out where the liner meets the soil under it. So I kinda doubt there would be air bubbles to show the location of a puncture. ???)

My ponds in question are made with EPDM rubber.

My fish pond was made with PVC twelve years ago but it has never leaked. The rubber ponds have bare rubber sides.

There is no way to know if a claw made the hole(s) or if they rubbed a rock through the rubber during their search. It isn't on the bottom of the pond which is covered by six inches of dirt but on the side half way up so that the water level won't stay full.

I can't imagine Buytl is any more puncture proof than any other type of liner!!??
I have not come across Butyl pond liner here in Ontario, most places sell EPDM. But it could well be available here.
I believe it is popular in the U.K. and is touted to be better, stronger, stretchy[er] and last longer, etc, than EPDM or PVC.
Whether it will stand up to a persistent raccoon's clawing is anyone's guess.
"Horton"

Here is a link that might be useful: Butyl pond liner in U.K.

Yes a raccoon could put a hole in an EPDM or Butyl liner. A PVC liner doesn't have a chance as it has a useful life of about 10 years compared to 50 years with EDPM. If the liner is not covered with rock than finding the hole is not hard. Once found the hole in a rubber liner is easily repaired. As far as butyl being stronger than EDPM the answer is that EDPM is far stronger. Because of this butyl liner use to be a lot thicker than EDPM. I don't know what the thickness of current butyl liners today but I know that they use to be 250 mils thick and that was just a little stronger than 45 mil EDPM.

Mike

Thanks for the further discussion of EDPM & butyl. Our line was sold to us as "butyl," but I'm not sure.

In any case, I still wonder about how one could detect small punctures that might possibly be made down, say, 12" or more below the customary water surface. I mean, even if the liner were leaking, would we see bubbles?? Repair might be easy, but how would we locate the hole(s)?

Joel, the water in your pond would drop to the level of the hole or tear in the liner.
If it were a small hole, you could slowly pour milk into the water around the edge of the pond,then you watch where the flow runs to.
Holes and tears can be patched up with EPDM liner tape if required.

"Horton"

Thanks for the replies. Interesting and useful info and opinions.

I had two baby raccoons chew two holes in my EPDM liner. It was 45 mils thick. I just put in the new liner and one month later there were holes all over from where the raccoons were chewing,or possibly teething as they were very young. I could see the teeth marks in the liner. My pond is 20 x 20, and a $350 EPDM liner which lasted one month. I've had this problem in the past, and the raccoons were the reason why I was replacing this liner due to chewing holes in the liner. I never had fish in the liner, nor other attractants that raccoons might find desirable to eat. I have thought about replacing this with a stockl tank, but found out they leak in about 3 to 4 years, or sooner. I need something that will last 15 to 20 years. My old liner head rocks all the way to the base. The coons went down to the bottom of the liner and chewed holes in that liner. I haven't been able to come up with a new solution to my problems. It's not unusual to see raccoons in my neighborhood, and my backyard. Maybe I should just fill it in with dirt, and make a Japanese garden out of that area. With no pond.